Page 178 - Automated Fingerprint Identification Systems (AFIS)

STANDARDS AND INTEROPERABILITY 163

Table 8.1
Record Contents Type of Data Record Types Used in the
ANSI/NIST-ITL 1-2003
Standard
Type 1 Transaction information ASCII
Type 2 Descriptive text (user-defined) ASCII
Type 3 Fingerprint Image data (low-resolution grayscale) Binary
Type 4 Fingerprint Image data (high-resolution grayscale) Binary
Type 5 Fingerprint image data (low-resolution binary) Binary
Type 6 Fingerprint image data (high-resolution binary) Binary
Type 7 Image data (user-defined) Binary
Type 8 Signature image data Binary
Type 9 Minutiae data ASCII
Type 10 Facial and SMT image data ASCII/Binary
Type 11 Reserved for future use —
Type 12 Reserved for future use —
Type 13 Latent image data (variable-resolution) ASCII/Binary
Type 14 Tenprint fingerprint impressions (variable-resolution) ASCII/Binary
Type 15 Palm print image data (variable-resolution) ASCII/Binary
Type 16 User-defined testing image data (variable-resolution) ASCII/Binary

As AFIS systems become more robust, new opportunities for data exchange
became possible, including the exchange of latent print and palm print image
1
data. These opportunities were addressed in ANSI/NIST-ITL 1-2003, which
replaced earlier versions of the standard. In this standard, the number of logical
record types grew to 16. The records are defined in Table 8.1. These last
changes were particularly important for the latent print community, since they
standardized the transmission standards for latent prints, allowing their trans-
mission across networks in a standardized fashion.
In the 2003 standard, record types 1, 2, and 9 use ASCII textual information
fields; record types 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, and 8 use binary information; and record types
10, 13, 14, 15, and 16 use a combination of ASCII and binary. The tagged-field
records, which are logical records containing unique ASCII field identifies for
variable-length data fields that are capable of being parsed based on the con-
2
tents of the first two fields, contain ASCII tagged textual fields and binary,
grayscale, or color image data. Two additional record types are reserved for
inclusion at a future date.
The following list summarizes each of the 16 different logical record types
used in the 2003 standard (also see Table 8.1).

1. Type 1: transaction record. The type 1 record is mandatory for each trans-
action. It provides information about the type and use or purpose of the trans-
action, a list of each logical record included in the file, the source or originator
of the physical record, and other useful information.

1 Available from ftp://sequoyah.nist.gov/pub/nist_internal_reports/sp500-245-a16.pdf.
2 ANSI/NIST_ILT 2000, p. 3.